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Birds of Prey
Episode 1.02 "Slick"
Written by Laeta Kalogridis and Melissa Rosenberg
Directed by Michael Katelman
Guest Stars: Silas Weir Mitchell (Slick)
Date: October 16, 2002
Hello again. Speaking of Hell, I figured I'd be fair and take in another episode of Birds of Prey. It seems to me that to really appreciate a program, one should take in at least a handful of episodes first. It might be fair to them, but my brain is slowly burning from the inside out. "Slick" was "better" than the pilot, but better is a relative term in this business. I mean, having my teeth drilled without novocaine would be better than that pile of shit.
At least BoP's use of the Freak of the Week concept is less nauseating than it is on Smallville. This week the Babes of Prey have to deal with Slick, the Moist Man. Everyone just calls him Slick, but given how freaking wet he is all the time I think "moist man" is apt. Slick is another of Harley Quinn's metahuman henchmen. His job was to rob an armored truck full of explosives, but he somehow gets caught by the police. I'm not too clear on how a man who can turn into an unassuming puddle could get captured, but I don't care enough to ask. Slick spends the rest of the ep killing the cops that caught him. It looks like revenge at first, which would make him a moron, but it turns out he's just killing off the cops before he robs the next armored shipment. Not a bad idea really.
The first cop he kills apparently dies of drowning, but since there's no sign of water around the corpse they just chalk it up to heart failure. The next cop he kills gets left sopping wet in the end. Real consistent. His attempts on Reese are foiled repeatedly by the Huntress. In the end, he's defeated by the simple application of fire which I guess is supposed to destroy water or some nonsense. Gotham physics are just as screwed up as Smallville physics, only with more ample breasts.
Dinah and Babs get some subplots to themselves. Babs is still making googly eyes at one of her fellow teachers. The whole superhero thing puts the kibosh on any sexing she might be thinking of having. There's also a bit where Babs shows off a cybernetically controlled office chair she likes to slide around in. For some reason, she takes the office chair on her date with Teacher Man. Why exactly? I mean, does riding around in an office chair seem remotely normal to anyone else? I thought they were supposed to be keeping a relatively low profile here.
Dinah's sub-subplot is really just a reminder that Helena doesn't trust her. We find that Dinah is a runaway, as she's claimed, but that she's been lying about her name and background. Mostly because she doesn't want them to contact her parents. This was really unnecessary. If she's going to get these people to trust her, how is lying going to help things? She claims it's complicated, but it's really just idiotic. In fact, I can't imagine a simpler set of circumstances. If she explained that her foster parents were assholes who treated her like a freak, I think Barbara and Helena would understand. Dinah looks much better in this episode than she did last week. Definitely didn't hurt my eyes at all. She's still an idiot, but a sexier idiot.
On the technical front, do we really need that crappy CGI cityscape transition? It's jarring and needless. Oh, and can someone tone down Mia Sara's acting? It's getting a bit melodramatic in here. I get that she's evil and all, but the Harley I know and love comes across a great deal more sweet than psychotic. Even if her psycho to sweet ratio is still higher than your average psychiatrist. Good ol' Harl did pass along some new info on her sweet Mr. J. We did learn that the Joker isn't dead, but imprisoned far away. She seems to have a wealth of resources, why not just bust him out instead of wasting time on "avenging" him?
When all is said and done, Huntress learns to trust Dinah, Barbara manages to salvage her potential relationship, and Dinah is finally candid about her background. What a lovely afternoon special this would be if it weren't playing in primetime. There's some improvement, but I still don't care for the execution of this show one bit. Lose the crappy Alfred opening and I'll probably be able to sit through one of these without bashing my head into a wall. "Slick" gets:
Episode Rating: 5 out of 10
- Steven Dougherty figures that, at this show's rate of improvement, it'll probably be watchable by 2005.
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